An eccentric teenage outcast, Donnie Darko, befriends Frank, a man in a bunny costume while pining for the new girl at his private school amid oppressive parents, teachers, and the popular kids. How will Donnie navigate the pressures of young adulthood when conflicted with doing what’s right versus doing what he’s told?
Well, he doesn’t. He dies. He fucking dies. Though the 2001 psychological and supernatural mindfuck that is Donnie Darko fulfills some baseline teen movie tropes, it couldn’t be further removed from the genre. Time travel, Patrick Swayze (R.I.P.) as a pedophile, Graham Greene, existential dread, universe-fulfilling prophecies, an eerie post-9/11 plane crash, and the Gary Jules version of Tears For Fears’ “Mad World” — Donnie Darko is a movie about everything/nothing and makes no real sense but prepared a generation of teens to blossom into anxious, neurotic, doom-dwelling adults and for that, we are forever committed to Sparkle Motion.
Screening begins at 10 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 28 at the State Theatre; 233 S. State St., Ann Arbor; 734-668-8397; michtheater.org/state. Tickets are $10.50.
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